Robert Sarvis, Libertarian Senate Candidate from Virginia, Denies “Spoiler” Charges from the GOP

I blogged on election night about some NBC exit polls that I
thought
lent some credence to the idea that, without Robert Sarvis in
the Virginia Senate race for the L.P., that Republican Ed Gillespie
might have won.

The heart of my analysis:

Sarvis drew equally from liberals, moderates, and conservatives
according to this poll—3 percent of each.

But when it gets to party identification, he drew statistically
nothing from Democrats, 3 percent from Republicans, and 7 percent
from Independents. Independents were otherwise split evenly 47-47
between Warner and Gillespie. So, there is indeed some cause for
GOPers to think that Sarvis’ presence in the race was bad for
them.

Sarvis wrote me last night with a contrary analysis, hooked to a
fact I neglected to account for: that not all Republicans, if the
exit poll is correct, actually voted Republican in this race–7
percent went Warner:

One can’t assume the 3 percent Rs would be voting
[Gillespie] in my absence—it’s quite likely these R voters would
have joined the 7 percent of Rs voting for
Warner. Polls throughout the race showed Warner
enjoying double-digit support among Rs, and a fair number
of Rs told us they can’t stomach voting for [Gillespie]. A lot of
business-type Republicans consider Warner acceptable, so
probably many Rs who really disliked [Gillespie]
voted for me because I was preferable to Warner, but would
otherwise have voted Warner not Gillespie. So those
R Sarvis voters were “taken” from Warner not
Gillespie.

Similar thing happened last year, with pretty high
certainty. A poll in September showed that *among Sarvis
supporters*, 60+ percent had a favorable opinion of Gov.
McDonnell, but 70+ percent had an UN-favorable view of Cuccinelli.
So I was a vessel for moderate, R-leaning, anti-Cuccinelli
voters who preferred voting for me to voting for MacAuliffe,
i.e., I “took” moderate R votes from MacAuliffe.

Moreover, my share of the Independent vote clearly skewed
younger, so from voters not inclined to vote D than
R.

Reason on the whole
“spoiler” thing with the Libertarian Party.